


You'd Better Do It 'Cause It Makes You Feel Good

by Domina_Temporis



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: 18th Century, Aziraphale Has Self-Esteem Issues (Good Omens), Crowley Loves Aziraphale (Good Omens), Discussion of glasses, Fashion & Couture, Fluff, Look i'm in quarantine have them having ridiculous conversations, M/M, POV Crowley (Good Omens), Pre-Canon, Self-expression through fashion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-26
Updated: 2020-03-26
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:21:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23330821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Domina_Temporis/pseuds/Domina_Temporis
Summary: Crowley and Aziraphale find themselves at a party in the middle of the 18th century, during which Crowley discovers Aziraphale has taken unusual inspiration for a new accessory.Or, why Aziraphale got reading glasses he doesn't need and why he thinks they make him look nifty.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 64





	You'd Better Do It 'Cause It Makes You Feel Good

**Author's Note:**

> I have no explanation. 
> 
> Title from If You Can't Beat Them by, guess who, Queen

Crowley wasn’t quite sure when his job had become attending parties to try to tempt those in power to use it in various terrible ways. It seemed to him they did that well enough on their own and didn’t need his help at all. Plus, he wasn't _entirely_ sure but he thought that parties used to be more fun, back in medieval times when a party was really an excuse to do as much drinking as possible and listen to bawdy songs. Now, even the music and dancing were so slow and precise it wasn’t any fun and all most of the attendees did was play cards.

Crowley was terrible at cards. Though he had to admit it was occasionally fun to make sure whoever proved themselves to be the biggest blowhard of the night lost everything. 

He arrived at this party dressed in a black waistcoat and jacket with blood-red lining and accents. His shoes were red too. His hair was perfectly curled, though he refused to powder it as was the fashion. His coppery hair accented the red in his outfit. Crowley always dressed with care, not that he particularly cared much about following the current fashions unless they suited him. But his look marked him out as something _other_ , he thought, and helped him to do his job.

If he occasionally caught Aziraphale looking at him appreciatively, it definitely didn’t hurt.

In fact, that was largely why Crowley continued to come to parties like this. He told his higher ups that the angel was usually sent to them, to foment all sorts of goodwill so the people in power would help orphans and widows and end wars, so Crowley had to be there to stop him. In reality, once at a party like this, Crowley and Aziraphale usually found an out of the way corner to sit back, drink, watch the humans make fools of themselves and usually end up in some philosophical argument. Which would then continue until they found themselves either in Crowley’s flat or Aziraphale’s, only Aziraphale’s had recently reached its capacity for how many books it could hold, leaving no room for anyone to enjoy themselves. Last time Crowley had come over, he’d ended up sitting on a precariously stacked pile of illuminated Bibles with his glass of wine and nearly fallen over. Worse than horses, those piles.

Crowley smiled at the memory. He had no idea if Aziraphale would be here tonight, though he hoped so. He made his way through the dancing couples and the Court ladies gossiping about the courtiers (he sent inspiration to one of them to mention that the Prince of Wales had recently been seen with a new paramour, certain that the rumor would be all over London in a week and would only inflame the tensions between His Majesty and his son). Crowley took a glass of punch, found his way into the side room where young ladies sought to display their musical prowess on the handsome gold piano (the current young lady had such a haughty expression on her face that Crowley deliberately caused her to miss a note). He didn’t see anyone he recognized though, and found his way into a different side room where the usual small groups of important men were playing cards. Crowley smiled. He recognized several members of Parliament and more than one Cabinet member, including the Prime Minister’s second in command. Whatever his title was. Crowley had never managed to grasp the inner workings of the British government. His specialty was generalized chaos, and everything had been much easier when there had just been a King and his counsellors. He waved a hand as he left and heard a number of exclamations as he left the room, as more than half the men in there looked at the cards they had drawn to find them to be exactly the opposite of what they needed. Crowley smiled to himself. More than half the government would be going home with their purses considerably lighter tonight.

Crowley made his way through the hallway and heard a familiar voice. His smile grew wider. So Aziraphale was here. He ducked into the room to find Aziraphale, alone with their host, a young man from a good family who’d so overdressed for the occasion he looked like a peacock, watching the angel anxiously. The walls were lined with overstuffed bookshelves and Aziraphale was bending over one particular book open on a table, looking both very pleased and very jealous. Crowley knew that look. It was the one when Aziraphale saw a book he very much wanted and couldn’t have but couldn’t prevent himself from waxing on about enthusiastically.  
It was an adorable look. One of Crowley’s favorites, though not quite as good as his uninhibited grin or the devious look he got when he was finding a way to break rules without admitting that was what he was doing.

“Yes, this is quite valuable. You see, the smudge on the side of this letter indicates an early printing, perhaps from a printer trained by Gutenberg himself!” Aziraphale said, pointing to a spot on the page. He glanced up and saw Crowley, though gave no acknowledgement. “You only find such markings in early printings, where mistakes in the type were fixed by illuminators.” His eyes shone with excitement, and Crowley, completely involuntarily, began making plans to slip this book that was making his angel so happy out of the house when the party was over to present to him at a later date.

“I see it imitates illumination,” their host said. “Thank you, Mr. Fell. I’ve wanted to have an expert look at this for a long time. I suspected it was valuable. My father collected so many books, as you can see.”

Aziraphale looked pained at the thought of the book only being valuable for its worth and not what it contained. “If perhaps, you decide to sell…” he said delicately.

“Oh, I shall certainly come to you first,” the young host said. “You have given me great peace of mind, Mr. Fell. Now I can be sure some of these other volumes might be worth as much as well.”

Aziraphale’s face relaxed when he knew he would have the chance to buy whichever of these books came on the market, though where he was going to put them, Crowley couldn’t imagine. He’d have to rent a storeroom. 

“I must return to my guests. I only wanted your opinion on this,” the peacock-like host said.

“Yes, of course,” Aziraphale said. “Might I stay here and look over the collection? It is a wonderful one.”

“Feel free, Mr. Fell.” The young host turned and left the room, nodding to Crowley as he passed. Crowley melted out of the shadows and went to stand by Aziraphale.

“Figures you’d find the only room in the house filled with books,” he said.

Aziraphale looked up. “Well, I was sent here to make sure some Cabinet member makes an agreement with some member of Parliament over something to do with the American colonies, but once I got here they were already in agreement and I’ve so been wanting to look at the family’s library. It’s one of the oldest in the country, you know!” He moved along the shelves as he talked, running his finger along the spines of several books, smiling as if they were old friends he hadn’t seen in a while. Every so often he would take one off the shelf and flip through it. One of these caused Aziraphale to make a little wordless exclamation and hurry over to the nearest table, opening the book and pulling something out of his pocket...a pair of reading glasses?

“Hold on,” Crowley said, grabbing Aziraphale’s wrist and plucking the glasses out of his hand. They were small, silver and oval shaped, designed to sit at the end of someone's nose. He gave his long-time opponent a look. “Are these reading glasses? What are you doing with reading glasses? You don’t need them, you’re an angel! Your eyesight is fine.”

Aziraphale snatched them back with an affronted look. “I know,” he said, perching them on his nose. The effect was immediate; despite wearing the bright white and silver clothes he seemed to prefer in this time period, so dripping with lace and shiny buttons that he stood to blind anyone who wasn’t wearing dark glasses, the reading glasses served to make him look exactly like a veteran librarian, charged with nothing more than safeguarding books. 

Crowley stood there, open-mouthed. “Angel, you can’t be serious.”

“I certainly am,” Aziraphale said stubbornly. “I like them. I think they make me look very stylish.”

Crowley rolled his eyes behind his own dark glasses. “Aziraphale, what on earth possibly gave you that idea?”

He knew immediately he’d overplayed his teasing, because Aziraphale’s eyes widened and he looked shocked. “You don’t like them?”

“I-well, no, I didn’t - you don’t need them!” Crowley spluttered, unsure how to repair the damage now.

“Well, no, I suppose not but,” Aziraphale sighed, taking the glasses off. “You always have such stylish eyeglasses, Crowley, and they always look...well, they’ve become such a part of your look. I thought I would give it a try, but if it doesn’t work…”

Oh no. Now Crowley knew he had messed up. Aziraphale had got the idea from him. Aziraphale liked the way he looked in his glasses to try to imitate him. Yes, it was true that Crowley needed glasses now that humanity tended to be scared away if someone had snake eyes instead of human ones, but he’d come to enjoy picking out new frames and matching them to his look. If he had to, he might as well make the most of it, he thought. He’d even once been responsible for making it a trend back in Rome (sure, they gave the credit to Nero, but where did they think he had got the idea?) And this wasn’t like an argument over theology or philosophy or ribbing each other over their respective jobs. No, this time he’d inadvertently insulted Aziraphale’s look.

“Well, if you like it, doesn’t matter what I think,” Crowley said quickly.

“Well, no, I suppose it doesn’t,” Aziraphale said, still managing to sound disappointed as he put them back on, somewhat more self-consciously. “Do you really think they look so ridiculous?”

“Er, no, not really,” Crowley said, trying desperately not to let on that the tiny glasses gave Aziraphale the appearance of a round little owl, rooting around in his nest of books.

For Satan’s sake. What was Crowley thinking? They suited his angel _perfectly_. “They suit you,” he finally said.

“Really?” Aziraphale said hopefully, breaking into one of his bright, sunny smiles that Crowley was convinced caused light to shine through his sunglasses.

“‘Course I do. Nobody else but you could pull it off,” Crowley said, completely sincerely.

“You’re making fun of me again,” Aziraphale said, giving him a knowing look.

OK. Yeah, he was, a little, but it was also true. “I can’t help it if ridiculousness suits you, angel,” he said.

For some reason, this made Aziraphale puff up proudly. This did not make him look less like an owl.

Crowley wasn’t sure if he’d ever been more in love than in that moment.

“Come on, let’s go get some more punch and watch the humans lose at cards,” he said.

“Oh, Crowley, you didn’t send them bad luck, did you?” Aziraphale asked.

“Not my fault if they decide to keep going once they’ve started losing,” Crowley said. “Maybe one of them will pull a sword out again.” It had happened at more than one party they’d attended.

“Oh, that was always dreadful,” Aziraphale said, though he followed Crowley out of the library and accepted the glass of punch. “They do overreact, don’t they?” he added fondly.

“Mmm, a bit,” Crowley agreed, taking a seat on a bench after he’d sent the two young ladies who were occupying it away with fears that their hair was coming undone. Aziraphale sat down next to him, and they clinked punch glasses. The only thing that could have made it better was if Crowley could have put an arm around Aziraphale’s shoulders.

That would come. Someday.


End file.
